A Survey of Dairy Cattle Behavior in Different Barns in Northern Italy

Abstract

Due to its increasing pressure on dairy cows, studies that investigate how to cope with heat stress are needed. The heat stress affects multiple aspects of cows’ lives, among which their behavior and welfare. In this study, a survey was carried out in eight farms located in Northern Italy to monitor and evaluate the environmental aspects of the barns and the behavioral responses of dairy cows. For one year, three periods were monitored: thermoneutral (T_S), hot (H_S) and cold (C_S) seasons. Temperature and relative humidity were measured by environmental sensors, and lying vs. standing time, number of lying bouts and their average duration were collected by accelerometers. The temperature-humidity index (THI) was quantified inside and outside of the barn. Results show that at the increase of the THI, behavioral adaptations occurred in all the farms, especially with a reduction of lying time and an increase of respiration rate. Four of the eight farms need interventions for improving the cows’ welfare. Here, environmental problems should be solved by introducing or improving the efficacy of the forced ventilation or by modifying the barn structure. Monitoring dairy barns with sensors and Precision Livestock Farming techniques can be helpful for future livestock farming to alert farmers on the need for their interventions to respond immediately to unwanted barn living conditions.

Random Forest Modelling of Milk Yield of Dairy Cows under Heat Stress Conditions

“…This is a significant aspect of the Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) approach, which is involving the livestock farming sector in a fast process and is providing farms with great opportunities of improvement of the production performance and the conditions of animal welfare, independently of the farm size [ 3 , 4 ]. In the dairy cattle sector, the availability of data recorded in real time concerning the environmental conditions of the barn and the production performances of the individual cows represent a quantitative knowledge basis with a huge potential of development of further informatic and electronic tools, able to achieve optimal conditions of animal welfare and more sustainable productions, in addition to improvements in milk quality and production efficiency [ 5 ]. In particular, the ever more widespread Automatic Milking Systems (AMSs) provide farmers with detailed data concerning health conditions and parameters connected to the milk produced, which are of great interest to optimize the production [ 6 , 7 ].…”

Describing the trend of ammonia, particulate matter and nitrogen oxides: The role of livestock activities in northern Italy during Covid-19 quarantine

“…Secondly, the area is poorly ventilated favoring the stagnation of pollutants and consequently contribute to the accumulation of PM ( Carugno et al, 2016 ). Lombardy is located in the middle of the Po valley and it is Italy's leading industrial and agricultural area ( Lovarelli et al, 2020 ), whose emissions (methane, ammonia, dinitrogen monoxide, etc.) worsen the air quality issue ( Rebolledo et al, 2013 ).…”

Relating Lying Behavior With Climate, Body Condition Score, and Milk Production in Dairy Cows

“…The average milk production was recorded equal to 27.9 ± 6.5 kg/day, and cows lie down 10.6 ± 2.6 h/day, which is a quite low value compared to literature suggestions but still included within the range of adequate daily lying time. For example, Tullo et al (13) found that cows commonly lie down for about 9-14 h/day when reared indoors, while Lovarelli et al (14) showed that seasonality affects the lying time, in particular that the monitored cows lie down for a longer period in the cold season (on average 12.06 h/day) than in summer (on average 10.04 h/day). This supports also the findings in which a lower lying time is related to high THI conditions and in which high THI is associated with lower feed intake, lower milk production, and variations in behavior (9,11,17,25,26).…”

“…Among them, for example, those reducing the negative effects caused by heat stress can play an important role. Natural and/or forced ventilation and shaded areas could improve the dairy cattle response to heat stress conditions that generally occur in summer (14,27,28). Specific feeding solutions with different frequency in feeding could also contribute in varying cow behavior (29).…”

“…In particular, when cows lie down, they ruminate, hence affecting milk production level. On the contrary, when they lie down more or less than the range, health problems, bad barn engineering, or heat stress are the most common causes (14). Therefore, modeling their lying behavior has undoubted importance for the farmer.…”